Sikkim govt to review decision to scrap hydel projects

Gangtok: The Pawan Kumar Chamling Government in Sikkim has decided to review its decision to scrap 11 hydel power projects in a bid to mollify the private developers one of whom has moved the High Court challenging termination of its project in East district.

“The Chief Minister, who also holds Power and Energy portfolio, would himself review the scrapping of 11 hydel projects and take appropriate decision in this regard,” Power and Energy Department Secretary Pema Wangchen said.

Asked whether the private developers would get back their individual projects for execution, Wangchen said it was for the chief minister to decide on it.

Sources, however, said that the state government had been rattled by the private developers’ threat to take the matter of termination of their projects to the Court for adjudication and so decided to return the scrapped projects to the individual developers for execution.

One of the developers — Madhya Bharat Power Corporation Ltd — whose project at Rongnichu (96 MW) in East district was among the projects terminated by the state government last month, has filed a petition in the Sikkim High Court challenging scrapping of the project.

Infrastructure development

Sources said that the state government has decided to restore the contracts to the developers to avoid disputes which might hamper the infrastructure development in the state under the Public-Private-Partnership mode.

“Private developers, at the same time, would be required to deliver on the execution of their projects this time once their contracts get restored,” the sources said.

The state government had slammed some developers of failing to acquire land for development of hydel projects, while in some cases, the developers had even failed to prepare the detailed project reports and obtain the mandatory clearance from various government departments prior to the commencement of their projects.